Welcome to Disobedience
Judging from today’s reprint of For Better or For Worse, we are headed into the Obedience Training Class storyline. Elly wonders if they accept children because her children are so disobedient. Even though this is the impression the strip is trying to give you this is not what I see:
1. Elly told Michael to put up the toys ages ago, but Michael is in the middle of building something. Aside from the flying saucer toy behind him, it looks like Michael is active with his toys and not just leaving them out after he finished playing with them. He probably would question why Elly wants him to put them up. In the very next panel, he is still playing with the same toys, so Elly’s demand did not even register with him. Why is this? Maybe he is being disobedient, or maybe he is just ignoring Elly’s arbitrary demand on him, since he knows she will not enforce it and doesn't really mean it.
2. Elly accusation of fighting between Michael and Lizzie appears nothing other than the idea that kids Lizzie’s age like to knock things down. When my daughter went through a similar phase, we tried to explain to her not to do that, and we put my son’s building stuff in a place where our daughter could not get to it.
In both cases, it seems less a situation of disobedience, and more of a situation where Elly has no idea how to handle her kids.
We also see 3 characteristics of Lynn Johnston-style art:
1. No relationship of objects to each other. In Panel 1, is the flying saucer toy hovering around in the air, attached to Lizzie’s head or lying on the floor behind her?
2. Where the action requires detail, there is nothing there at all. In Panel 2, behind Michael’s pointing hand is the invisible lower body of John Patterson. I think this must be the precursor to the use of silhouettes in such situations, which Lynn uses a lot in the modern drawings to show things Lynn doesn’t want to draw, but wants the reader to know is there.
3. Glasses without the ear piece (which is almost as fun as glasses with no eyes behind them). This shows up in Panels 3 and 4, and is a long-standing trademark of the comic strip.
1. Elly told Michael to put up the toys ages ago, but Michael is in the middle of building something. Aside from the flying saucer toy behind him, it looks like Michael is active with his toys and not just leaving them out after he finished playing with them. He probably would question why Elly wants him to put them up. In the very next panel, he is still playing with the same toys, so Elly’s demand did not even register with him. Why is this? Maybe he is being disobedient, or maybe he is just ignoring Elly’s arbitrary demand on him, since he knows she will not enforce it and doesn't really mean it.
2. Elly accusation of fighting between Michael and Lizzie appears nothing other than the idea that kids Lizzie’s age like to knock things down. When my daughter went through a similar phase, we tried to explain to her not to do that, and we put my son’s building stuff in a place where our daughter could not get to it.
In both cases, it seems less a situation of disobedience, and more of a situation where Elly has no idea how to handle her kids.
We also see 3 characteristics of Lynn Johnston-style art:
1. No relationship of objects to each other. In Panel 1, is the flying saucer toy hovering around in the air, attached to Lizzie’s head or lying on the floor behind her?
2. Where the action requires detail, there is nothing there at all. In Panel 2, behind Michael’s pointing hand is the invisible lower body of John Patterson. I think this must be the precursor to the use of silhouettes in such situations, which Lynn uses a lot in the modern drawings to show things Lynn doesn’t want to draw, but wants the reader to know is there.
3. Glasses without the ear piece (which is almost as fun as glasses with no eyes behind them). This shows up in Panels 3 and 4, and is a long-standing trademark of the comic strip.
posted by howard at 10:11 PM
9 Comments:
I love how Elly wants Michael to put away toys he's actually playing with at that moment. (And he could be playing with that flying saucer too, maybe he's building a space castle.) I love how she freaks out and accuses her little kids of "fighting again" over a toddler doing what toddlers do, and Michael reacting the way a 6 year old would. I love that, though I don't ever plan on having kids, I don't particularly like being around young kids, and I didn't babysit all that much, I'm better with kids than Elly is.
Elly's a thoroughgoing villain. I expect her to shop and straighten Liz's hair eventually, to teach her humility, and not allow her bread and cheese even when breakfast is inedible. I think she makes Michael sleep in the closet under the stairs. And I know one day she'll leave her toddler to wander off to the ravine by purposefully not fixing a latch said toddler can open, and when that doesn't work, she'll scream at the child, now teen, for doing her homework and other little things. Elly "officially" quit being a mother when her third child was 16, but I don't see when she ever started being one.
howard,
In both cases, it seems less a situation of disobedience, and more of a situation where Elly has no idea how to handle her kids.
And yet when a trumanf or a John Patterson or even an Amazonian catfish supervillain asks what she does all day, she screams and calls us bad people. Worse, there are trainloads of idiots like Inman who see themselves in her and want to be her.
clio_1,
Elly's a thoroughgoing villain.
Great minds think alike. I've come to the conclusion that Lynn might, without intending toed have given the world a Villain Protagonist.
clio_1,
I love how Elly wants Michael to put away toys he's actually playing with at that moment.-
Such a thing could work if Elly said something to go along with it like, “It’s time to go visit so-and-so” or “It’s time for bed”. Instead she just seems to be arbitrarily saying it.
I love how she freaks out and accuses her little kids of "fighting again" over a toddler doing what toddlers do, and Michael reacting the way a 6 year old would. -
Absolutely. Siblings will fight, but Lizzie has to be a little older before she will get to the point where she will intentionally antagonize her brother into a fight.
DreadedCandiru2,
Worse, there are trainloads of idiots like Inman who see themselves in her and want to be her.-
There are lots of people who have bad parenting moments. Seeing Elly have them also, makes them feel better about themselves and Lynn gives us lots of opportunities.
I've come to the conclusion that Lynn might, without intending toed have given the world a Villain Protagonist.-
I think you are right about this. The main issue with Elly Patterson, is when you try to think of her as a woman who is trying to be a good mom, wife, person. She works much better as a well-rounded villain. The best villains are ones who do villainous things, but have understandable motives for doing the things they do. In this respect, Elly Patterson works very well. If you read the strip in those terms, many of the stories become more palatable. I have often said if you read the love story of Liz and Anthony as the story of 2 obsessed, selfish people who destroy anyone foolish enough to get involved with them; then the story works. We need to stop thinking of the Pattersons as good.
howard,
She works much better as a well-rounded villain. The best villains are ones who do villainous things, but have understandable motives for doing the things they do. In this respect, Elly Patterson works very well. If you read the strip in those terms, many of the stories become more palatable. I have often said if you read the love story of Liz and Anthony as the story of 2 obsessed, selfish people who destroy anyone foolish enough to get involved with them; then the story works. We need to stop thinking of the Pattersons as good.
I stopped thinking of them as being good when John and Elly did a high-five because April realize that Awfulny and Lizardbreath would do exactly what they did. I was willing to cut them some slack during Mike and Dee's Big Fat Fake Wedding because they were too stupid to realize that Dee was playing them but to have them turn around and drool over the possibility of watching Liz and the son John wishes he had screwing people over so that they can get a great deal on a hovercar destroyed any lingering amount of good-will I had. If they were Transformers, they'd be Decepticons.
Dreadedcandiru2,
I stopped thinking of them as being good when John and Elly did a high-five because April realize that Awfulny and Lizardbreath would do exactly what they did.-
Now, thanks to reprints, you can take that same thinking and apply to the early years. Isn't it nice to know that Lynn Johnston's writing has been so consistent over the years that it takes very little to apply the villain label to the characters even when they first appeared?
howard,
Isn't it nice to know that Lynn Johnston's writing has been so consistent over the years that it takes very little to apply the villain label to the characters even when they first appeared?
In a twisted way, it is. You can see why and when Elly started thinking that the world owes her a free pass and exactly why she doesn't. You can also determine how long it took for John to really start fearing her blind rages.
dreadedcandiru2,
You can see why and when Elly started thinking that the world owes her a free pass and exactly why she doesn't. You can also determine how long it took for John to really start fearing her blind rages.-
The other fun question is whether or not this same progression occurred in Lynn Johnston's own household.
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